Bill responding to O’Meara judgment ‘may be inconsistent’ with its principles
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Eilis Barry
Social welfare legislation introduced in response to a landmark Supreme Court judgment proposes to make unnecessary changes which “may be inconsistent” with the judgment itself, FLAC has said.
The Social Welfare (Bereaved Partner’s Pension) Bill 2025 was drawn up by the government in response to the judgment handed down in John O’Meara & Ors v The Minister for Social Protection, Ireland and the Attorney General [2024] IESC 1.
The court found that the refusal of a widower’s contributory pension to a man following the death of his cohabiting partner and mother to their three children was unconstitutional as it “makes a distinction that is arbitrary and capricious”.
The bill will expand entitlement to widow/widower’s pensions to qualified cohabitants and their children.
However, legal rights group FLAC — which represented John O’Meara and his children in the case — yesterday criticised the bill for also proposing to reduce the existing entitlement of families where the parents were divorced or separated to survivor’s pensions.
Appearing before the Oireachtas social welfare committee, FLAC chief executive Eilis Barry said: “The reduction in the social welfare entitlements of a particularly vulnerable category of lone parents and their children — those who were reliant on maintenance from a former partner who has died — is in no way required by the O’Meara decision.
“In fact, the proposed changes may be inconsistent with the equality and children’s rights principles which underpin that landmark judgment.”
She continued: “The proposed changes will mean that all future applicants for a survivor’s pension will be required to prove to the Department of Social Protection that they were living with their partner in an intimate and committed relationship in the two years before that partner’s death, even where they were married and living in the same house […]
“The new rules require the potentially invasive examination of the nature of a couple’s relationship and whether they were living together. This would occur after a bereavement when respecting the surviving partner’s right to privacy and dignity should be of tantamount concern.”
FLAC is seeking to have the bill amended during committee stage, which begins next Wednesday 25 June.
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